1738 Anderson’s second edition.
Described as the New Book of Constitutions, by James Anderson, D.D., in a long title-page. Collation : plate ; title-page ; reverse blank ; pp. i — x, dedication and preface ; two pages not numbered, sanction to publish, plate with the arms of Carnarvon and his titles ;
pp. 1 — 230 text ; two pages not numbered, corrigenda and publisher’s announcements. The songs conclude on p. 215, and are followed by a reprint of a pamphlet (No. F. 7 infra) ” A Defence of Masonry, pub- lished a.d. 1730. Occasion’d by a Pamphlet call’d Masonry Dissected ” (as to which vide infra No. C. 3). This also appears in a Pocket Companion of this same year (vide infra No. B. 4). This is in turn followed by Brother Euclid’s letter to the Author against Unjust Cavils, which is dated 1738, the authorship of which is unknown. The leaf pp. 129 — 130 is substituted for an original which contained various errors, the most conspicuous of which was the writing STEPHEN instead of FRANCIS, Duke of Lorraine.
No copy appears to be known with the original leaf in situ, but in one copy, at present in private ownership, it is found attached to the cover. The Plate is the same as that of 1723, with the exception of the lettering at bottom ” Engraved by John Pine in Aldersgate Street, London,” which is now deleted. This Plate measures 8$ffX7f”.
The work was printed — with identical typing — on paper of two different sizes, 8f”x7i” and 7i”X5i*- The small paper copies could not therefore have taken the Plate without folding, and as none appear to be 14 known that have it, it would in fact seem that none were in fact issued with it. Mr. Hughan, in his Preface to the facsimile issued by Lodge Quatuor Coronati in 1890, stated that he had only succeeded up to that time in tracing twenty-six copies of this edition.
The imprint is : — LONDON : / Printed for Brothers Caesar Ward and Richard Chandler, / Booksellers, at the Ship without Temple-Bar ; and sold at their / Shops in Coney -Street, YORK, and at SCARBOROUGH-SPAW. / MDCCXXXVIII. / In the Vulgar Year of Masonry, 5738.
source;
THE RARE BOOKS OF FREEMASONRY By LIONEL VIBERT
P.M. Lodge Quatuor Coronati, Author of The Story of the Craft, etc.
Editor Miscellanea Latomorum.
London: ‘The Bookman’s Journal” Office 173-5 Fleet 1923 Street,
E.C.4 The rare books of freemasonry by Lionel Vibert
1923
Nr (5)
